


Snow and Bone

by Jess_B_Fossil



Category: Yuri!!! on Ice (Anime)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Angst, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Angst with a Happy Ending, Eventual Fluff, Eventual Romance, Eventual Smut, Happy Ending, Inspired by Hallmark Christmas Movies, M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-12-25
Updated: 2021-01-22
Packaged: 2021-03-10 18:07:59
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 16,099
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28321392
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Jess_B_Fossil/pseuds/Jess_B_Fossil
Summary: Yuri peaked at twenty and it went unnoticed in a haze of quad-flips and overworked joints. When he's twenty-eight, his Grandpa dies and it all goes to hell. He trips out to his family's old inn, intent on selling it, only to find love instead.
Relationships: Otabek Altin/Yuri Plisetsky
Comments: 13
Kudos: 29
Collections: Otayuriadvent2020





	1. I

**Author's Note:**

> Happy Holidays! This is my fic for the Otayuri Advent Calendar event. I'm uploading the first chapter now, the second chapter later tonight, and the last chapter sometime tomorrow, so three whole days of Chrimbus cheer. 
> 
> With that, I give this warning: This first chapter is heavy with angst, but it only goes uphill from here. I promise. 
> 
> CW: Mentions of death, burnout, and self-deprecating viewpoints. It only gets better from here, I promise.

Most figure skaters hit their peak in their thirties, hanging on for as long as they can while they eke out what little they have left in their tired bones. 

Yuri peaked at twenty and it went unnoticed in a haze of quad-flips and overworked joints. It can be like that when you wake up thinking about skating, ate thinking about skating, and slept thinking about it too. 

When he realized it, when Yuri finally felt that split in his gut as his love for the sport melted away, it was already too late; all that’s left behind is an angry shell of a has-been who aches more and more each day that he puts his skates on.

The rink is frigid, not just in temperature but in tone as well. Yuri is misery on ice, his clipped words as crisp as his pitch-black turtleneck. Everyone keeps a wide berth as they always do, fifteen feet away at all times. Yuri fidgets, fingers twisting around each other, yanking and pulling, trying his best to ground himself. It’s getting harder, he finds, his motivation slipping away a little bit more with each puff of frozen breath.

Yuri likes the sharp, bitter cold of the rink and the way that his blades cut into the freshly hewn ice. He might not burn for competition as he used to, but there’s comfort in the routine of it all. Yuri doesn’t have to think while on the ice; his footwork is known and the jumps are familiar, everything muscle memory and second-nature. It’s easy to slip into and just forget.

Skating is the only thing that he’s good at which is probably why he hates it so much. Bogged down by expectations, interviews, and billboards with his face plastered across them. Children who watch with adoring gazes, hoisting him high onto a pedestal that he doesn’t deserve. He’s not a role model and everyone knows that. 

Adults too, with their gossip boards dedicated to his every move. Yuri can’t grab a cup of coffee, let alone date, without pictures of himself finding the internet. Doing the most innocuous of shit. _Yuri left his home today and bought a loaf of bread._

And, it’s not that Yuri dates well, to begin with; most can’t handle his volatile personality and penchant for yelling. Between that and the long, grueling days at the rink, Yuri’s nothing but a recipe for disaster when it comes to being a partner. There isn’t a point in trying and coming home to an empty house is easier than coming home to empty expectations. 

Yuri doesn’t work for championships anymore, only the Olympics. Other competitions are child’s play, not even worth the thought. He’s fresh off the ice in Italy the year before and already thinking about 2030. 

“You’ll be thirty-one,” Yakov said after he’d secured the gold, having barely left the kiss-and-cry. Avoiding reporters and questions about smashing a new world record. Yuri wanted to feel happiness, but victory only tasted like ash in his mouth. And, Yakov, ever the motivational coach, was already one step ahead, thinking about the next plan before the current one finished playing out. “Older than the rest but with you it’s doable. You can still find your way to the ice.”

Yuri almost told him that he didn’t want another Olympics, but he’d been too much of a coward to commit to retirement. He still is, and it’s an ever-present cloud that casts a shadow over him. Skating is the only thing that Yuri knows; without it, there’s nothing left.

And so, Yuri pushes himself to the brink, legs burning and back pulled taught, blades digging into the ice as he readies for a jump. Marking a spot on the wall and counting his rotations. Quads don’t come easily anymore, but he manages. Only barely. Yuri’s good at faking ease. 

Yakov doesn’t look the type, but he’s optimistic. Yuri’s a shoo-in again, naturally, he says. Everyone on the team agrees with two exceptions: Yuri who knows better and Mila who knows Yuri better than he knows himself. 

Yuri sticks his landing and feels wholly unsatisfied with the result. There are a few polite claps from other skaters. Yakov seems satisfied enough to not jeer. The juniors seem jealous and annoyed. Mila regards him with a long, pointed stare before skating her way over to him. 

She leans against the barrier, one toepick deep into the ice to steady herself. “Yuri, what the hell was that?”

Yuri grunts, leaving the ice entirely and slapping his skate guards on. He doesn’t go far, only a few feet before leaning over to touch his toes. “I didn’t stretch enough.”

“Bullshit,” Mila says. 

“I don’t bullshit,” Yuri says, throwing some bite into his words. But Mila isn’t like the others, she doesn’t back down. She stares at him instead, disapprovingly. Yuri sighs and says, “Okay, so I bullshit a lot, but not this time.”

“So what? You’re just off your game?”

“Contrary to popular belief, I’m not fucking perfect.”

Mila hums at that, tapping her chin. “That’s true, but it’s not like you to actually show it.”

“Yakov didn’t yell so it wasn’t as noticeable as you make it out to be.” His words aren’t as confident as they could be, though, sounding a little unsure. Yuri rests his forehead against his shins, holding himself over in the stretch as he thinks.

“Yakov’s an ancient, half-blind man. It’s a miracle that he still coaches. If he’d seen that ten years ago, he’d have you skating sprints and then jumping until your toes bleed.”

Mila isn’t wrong. Yuri stands upright, rolling out his shoulder. “Maybe he’s eased up.”

“Eased up,” Mila says, amused. Then, she scoffs. “No, I think he thinks you’re a lost cause.”

Yuri starts at that, eyes narrowing at her. Mila knows where Yuri stands in regards to his skating, but she’s never so blatantly mentioned it within the rink where someone can overhear. “Something’s pissed you off,” Yuri says, crossing his arms. “Lose another boyfriend?”

“This isn’t about me, it’s about you. Besides, I’m not the one who sleeps their way through men. Last I checked, that’s you.”

Yuri misses uninhibited sex, but lately, he hasn’t been in the mood; some men are clingy and don’t understand the concept of casual, which is all you’ll get if you’re interested in Yuri Plisetsky. 

He drops to the bench and yanks off a skate, moving to rub at his sock-clad foot. He’s already aching and he’s barely begun, signaling the start of a very rough day. Yuri knows that it’ll end with an ice bath. “Yakov says I’m pretty much guaranteed for the next Olympics,” he says. 

Mila rolls her eyes. “Duh. Of course, you are, everyone knows that. Even as broken and busted as you are, you’ll always be a head up.”

“I’m not broken and busted,” Yuri says, but he sounds as tired as he feels. And judging by the way Mila frowns, she can tell. “Not entirely broken,” he amends.

“You know, Yuri,” she says, “there’s nothing wrong with taking a break.”

“Breaks are for those who aren’t serious.” Familiar words they’ve all heard a thousand times.

Mila’s still leaning on the opposite side of the barrier, so she can’t reach out and smack him. Yuri knows she wants to. “Dumb words coming from an even dumber man,” she says.

“Yakov’s the entire reason I’m where I am,” Yuri says, defensively. His relationship with his coach isn’t easily articulated, and yes, it’s changed a lot over the years. But, Yuri knows that he can trust Yakov who’s an unwavering constant in his life. He’s not sure why he can’t trust him with the truth. 

Yuri thinks that maybe it’s because he’s barely accepted it himself. He doesn’t want to, refuses to.

“Yeah,” Mila says. “Exactly. Right where you are. Yuri, you walk into this rink looking sourer every day. Eventually, everyone else will notice, and then what?”

Yuri looks to her, still kneading at the arch of his foot. “Yeah, and then what?” he asks. “I’ll keep skating and nothing will change.”

Mila watches him for a moment, quietly, and then she says, “Burnout isn’t easy, but coming to terms with it is even harder.”

Yuri chooses to ignore her, shrugging off his other boot to rub at his foot. Mila doesn’t say anything further, just leans over the wall and watches him, a soft look of pity on her face. Yuri almost snarls at the sight of it; he doesn’t want her pity. 

He doesn’t snap back though, too beat to even push at her. He’s not in the mood. So, he kneads at the arch of his foot instead, digging into the sore muscles there. And then, on to his ankle, looking for any strain. 

Yuri isn’t sure the reason he’d landed his quad so piss-poor, but there isn’t harm in double-checking. His ankle seems sound enough which leaves only one option. 

“You’re getting older, Yurotchka,” his grandfather said to him the last time they spoke on the phone. Yuri doesn’t remember exactly when that was, which means it’s been entirely too long. Yuri’s only got one thing he gives a shit about and that’s Grandpa, who he loves more than anything.

Yuri can certainly treat him better than he has as of late. 

“You’re going to skate yourself to death,” Mila says when the silence stretches for too long. 

“Nonsense,” Yuri says, still refusing to look at her. 

“I think that you want to.” 

Yuri’s fingers pause and he finally looks to meet her face. She stares him down, mouth pulled into a stubborn frown. On a good day, Mila might bench press a hockey player for the fun of it. This isn’t one of those days, this is one of the bad ones, the kind where she’s more likely to slice a throat with the blade of her skate, then brag about it. 

“Take a break,” Mila finally says. “I don’t care what you do Yuri, just get off the fucking ice. You aren’t doing yourself any good.”

“This is where I belong,” Yuri says, but it’s more to convince himself than anything else. It’s easier sometimes when he pretends or says it aloud. 

“Once, maybe,” Mila says. “Everyone has an end.” 

Yuri says nothing as he slides his skate back on, pulling the strings tighter than he wants to prevent rolling an ankle. Then he pulls the other on, fingers curling around the laces, grunting slightly as he yanks hard. He knots and then double-knots, thinking about what Mila’s said. 

The worst part of it all is that she’s right. Burnout happens. It’s okay to accept it. He’ll skate himself to death, dying on the ice just like he was born and lived on it. At least he’d go out with a bang. 

Yuri stands, tapping one skate against the ground and then the other, testing his ties. “Then you’re right,” Yuri finally says as he passes by her. He pauses at the gate just before stepping back onto the ice. “I’ll skate myself to death. Sounds better than living once I’m done because this is all I’ve got.”

Mila opens her mouth to reply, but Yuri throws on his headphones and pushes right past her. She doesn’t call after him, just watches from her spot at the barricade, and that’s fine by him because he’s got more important things to do.

Yuri’s skates cut a smooth path along the ice as he spreads his arms wide and glides. His muscles ache as strain pulls at his body. But, he’s not without determination. He pushes through it, and Yuri knows if he can still pull it together on the ice, he can do so off the ice. 

He’d rather die trying.

#

Yuri comes home to a dark and empty apartment. He drops his sports bag to the ground, kicks off his boots, and immediately sets about putting together an ice bath. It’s more tiring than he’d care to admit, setting the water to cold and then hauling several pots of ice to the tub, but Yuri’s too stubborn to waste money on those tiny-little spas that barely fit his feet. 

He drops the lid on the toilet, sits down in his boxers, and hisses when his feet hit the water. But it’s relief, instant comfort that washes over his blistered skin. 

Some skaters’ feet don’t look terrible, people like Mila get regular pedicures and bind their toes with tape to prevent broken nails. Yuri doesn’t bother, not with ballet and not with this. His toes are crooked with cracked nails, corns, and bunions, bruises, and blisters. 

The cold water heals but sometimes he wonders if it’s enough because nothing ever seems to cure the weariness in his core, least of all the ache in his feet. 

He scrolls through social media on his phone. There’d been a point in his life where he’d been damn near addicted, constantly looking through the feeds of other performers or even his own. He’d snatch up gossip magazines and laugh at the wildly inaccurate stories with Mila over water and a protein bar, recharging between training sets. 

Now he barely reads, eyes glazing over as he does his best to ignore the shit that’s being said about him. He doesn’t need to be reminded, he knows it all already. Abrasive and arrogant, unwilling to interview. Can’t keep a man for longer than a day.

“No shit,” Yuri murmurs as his thumb slides over the phone screen. “That’s by design.”

It never bothered him before, but maybe that’s because he was young and stupid. He’s a little bit older now and probably still stupid, but with a silver-lining of wisdom. Just a smidge. Enough to be exhausted by everyone’s obsession with his life. 

Being a celebrity already sucks, he doesn’t need mooning housewife’s talking about his tight ass in an outfit, or bemoaning the fact that he’ll never look their way. A decade ago, Yuri wouldn’t have ever thought he’d want peace basking in the glory and attention. Nowadays it’s the only thing that he wishes for. 

It’s what he gets in the bathroom, feet dunked into ice-cold water as he freezes away the aches of his brutal sport. Precious moments of quiet reflection. Sometimes he stares into the water, wondering where he’d be if he’d lived another life. Sometimes it’s into the mirror, wondering what others see in him. 

His reflection has accepted that he’s past his prime, so why does he hang on so stubbornly?

Yuri pulls his feet from the water with a wince and dries them off tenderly. Several moments later, he sits on the couch with ointments and lotions and bandages, and as he watches old Star Trek re-runs, he carefully tends to his battered skin. Smoothing away the hurt, anointing the cuts, and bandaging it all away. 

He wishes he could just bandage away these hopeless feelings too. 

At first, he doesn’t hear his phone from where it sits in the kitchen, charging. The second time it rings, he doesn’t answer it, too tired to share words with anyone other than himself. But then it rings a third time. And then a fourth, and Yuri knows that something is wrong. 

He expects Mila. Maybe Yakov or Lillia, if they’re in a stubborn mood. He doesn’t expect his mother and immediately, Yuri is on the defensive. With her, he always is, hackles raised like an agitated cat, ready to swipe out with claws extended. 

“I’d made it clear the last time you called,” Yuri says, “to not expect anything from me.” She only calls when she needs something. Yuri refuses to indulge. 

Strangely, she doesn’t immediately respond. Their calls are a business transaction to his mother because as far as she’s concerned she’d cleaned her hands of him decades ago. They never share words for longer than necessary and it’s usually because she needs money or a favor. 

“Nikolai is gone,” she says, her voice detached like she doesn’t give a damn. Probably because she doesn’t.

“Are you just now noticing?” Yuri asks. “He moved from Losta nearly six years ago.” Leaving everything he’d owned behind in storage, citing that a facility would be more comfortable. Yuri knows it’s because his grandfather gets lonely. He feels guilty about that. 

There’s another pause, and then his mother says, “No, Yuri.” Her voice is soft, almost caring like she’s afraid that she’s about to break him. “He’s gone. The home just called me.”

At first, Yuri doesn’t understand and his mother keeps talking over him. “I’m not sure why I was the emergency contact, it should have been you. I expect that you’ll handle everything from here on out?”

“Handle everything,” Yuri repeats, his voice flat. 

“The funeral of course.” His mother seems confused, if somewhat annoyed. 

“Funeral.”

There’s a pause. “Yuri, your grandfather is dead.” She punctuates every word like she’s talking to a five-year-old. The breath is knocked out of him like he’s just flubbed a jump and tumbled across the ice instead. 

“He’s--”

“As you know, I’m out of the country so I’m not in the position to handle--”

“You’re not in the position?” Yuri cuts in. “Grandpa is dead, and you’re not in the position?”

His mother sighs. “It’s not as though this doesn’t affect me,” she says, and there’s the tiniest waver to her voice. Maybe she actually gives a shit this time, but Yuri isn’t holding his breath, no matter what she says. 

“I’ll handle it,” Yuri says, curtly, feeling utterly defeated. “I’ll call the home.” His mother calls his name once more, but he hangs up before she can say anything else. 

Yuri sits there on his couch, numb down to his toes but this time it’s not from the cold of a skating rink, or an ice bath, or even from throwing camel spins all day long. He’d just been thinking of his grandfather earlier that day, planning a trip out to the home where he’d lived. Now he’ll be planning a trip for an entirely different reason. 

At first, Yuri laughs at the absolute absurdity of it all, shoulders shaking as his chest heaves. And then his shoulders shake for a different reason and his heaves turn to sobs, tears slipping down his cheeks in shiny streaks. 

Yuri can’t think of the last time he’s had a good cry; he’s usually like impenetrable stone, unwilling to give in something as pesky as feelings. Grandpa always hated that, Yuri thinks, hated that Yuri bottled shit up. 

So he doesn’t this time, crying until there’s nothing left, and the deep hole that’s been settled into Yuri’s gut for years widens into a chasm. 

#

Yuri hasn’t taken a day off since he was ten, just growing out of his training skates. Even in the wake of his grandfather’s death, he doesn’t want to. The retirement home Grandpa stayed in was only a couple of hours by train, so Yuri trips out there and back in a day, still managing to swing by the rink for a late-night practice. 

Mila wants to say something, he can tell, but she doesn’t. Instead, she watches from the north end of the ring, arms crossed over her chest and lips tugged into a frown. Yuri ignores her as he beats out his grief with complicated footwork drills until he’s dripping with sweat and barely able to stand. 

It isn’t until he’s shoving his skates into his bag that she dares approach him. “Yuri,” she starts quietly but then falls silent, unsure how to continue. Yuri knows what she wants to say; _You’re doing it again, working yourself too hard. This isn’t good for you. Take a break._

_Or worst of all, What would your grandfather say?_

It’s her favorite question, usually uttered angrily because Yuri doesn’t listen to anyone except Grandpa. And now Grandpa’s gone. 

“Wednesday,” Yuri says, pulling on his street boot and yanking the laces tight. “It’s short notice but Yakov’s approved the time. He didn’t want a service so we’re just going to pick up his ashes.”

“Yuri, if you want a service, you can--”

“He wanted it simple,” says Yuri. “He knew I’d be busy, so he wanted something with no fuss. So, we’ll say a few words and I’ll then take him home.”

Mila frowns at that. “And then it’s right back to the rink, I suppose.” Well, she’s always known him better than most. 

“Only three years until the Olympics.”

“Yuri--”

“It’ll be my last.”

“Yuri--”

“And now it really _is_ the only thing I’ve got left.”

“Yuri.”

Mila doesn’t sound angry, she sounds practically heartbroken. Yuri refuses to look at her because he knows that if he does, he’ll break down too and it doesn’t matter how much he loves Mila, he won’t let her see him like this.

“It’s what he’d want,” Yuri says. “He’d rather I do what I do best.”

Mila sighs. “It’s not for him, you know,” she finally says. “A service. It’s for you and whatever closure you need.”

“I don’t need closure,” Yuri says as he finishes tying off his other boot. 

Mila, wisely, doesn’t respond. Instead, she reaches out, fingers finding his shoulder. Yuri goes rigid but then he sags slightly under the weight of her hand. His palm finds hers, Mila’s skin soft and warm under his, and he squeezes it tight. 

And then, as soon as the moment began it’s over, Yuri letting go as he stands. He leaves the rink without even looking at her. 

There’s a letter waiting for him at his apartment when he steps in. He knocks his boots off, turning the envelope over in his hands. He drops it onto the counter in the bathroom before setting up his ice bath. 

He sits on the toilet like always as he sinks his feet into the frigid pool. Yuri opens the letter and he reads it, eyes scanning over the words. Once and then twice. And then a third time. 

Yuri sighs, not wanting anything to do with this. 

He doesn’t even feel the ice bath. 

#

Yuri can’t find any words so he takes the urn silently. 

Mila, Yakov, and Lillia are there alongside him without any judgment. They wait patiently, watching him like they’re afraid he might startle at any second. Yuri doesn’t, he just barely manages to hold onto himself. 

Grandpa always liked the park, so Yuri tells Mila that he’s going to take him for a walk. Yakov and Lillia part ways at the funeral home, but Mila goes with Yuri instead. Keeping an eye on him, no doubt.

Yuri doesn’t have the energy to be annoyed, leaving behind nothing but a drained and tired husk, so he doesn’t fight her off. 

“He left me the inn,” Yuri finally says. They’re standing in the middle of the park on a nice little bridge that overlooks a pond. Grandpa always liked dumb things like ponds because they reminded him of the first time he’d seen Yuri try to skate. 

Yuri hates that memory because all he remembers is his leg going straight through the ice and nearly dying. An over-exaggeration probably, but that’s how he remembers it.

“I didn’t even know he still owned it,” Yuri continues. “I thought he sold it years ago when he moved into the retirement home.” He pauses, heaving a deep sigh. “I don’t know what he wants me to do with it.”

Mila nudges his shoulder with her own. “What do you want to do?”

Yuri thinks for a moment. “My immediate thought is to sell it. It’s in a nice little village, it’ll sell well.”

“I’m sensing a _but,”_ Mila says. 

“Well, it’s Grandpa’s. And Grandma’s. Like, it’s theirs, and I just--” He sighs. “I can’t run it, I don’t have the time. I’m busy with… I’m doing my own thing. And like, I could hire a manager but I wouldn’t trust them, you know? No one would be good enough, so if I sold it, I wouldn’t have to think about it.”

“But you would. You’d think about it all the time.”

Mila’s right. Yuri had spent the winters of his youth there before his mother decided that work was more important than raising a kid. Winters turned into entire years until he’d enrolled in Yakov’s skating program and started boarding in Moscow. 

The inn was once Yuri’s home, but not anymore, hasn’t been for a long time.

“I’m torn about it,” Yuri says. 

“Think about it then,” Mila says. “Take some--”

“Mila--”

“No,” she cuts in. “Listen to me. Take some time off. Go to the inn. Think about it. Yuri, you need a break.”

“I need a distraction,” Yuri says. Anything to take his mind off of Grandpa, the inn, his entire godforsaken life. “I need to get back to the rink.”

Mila and Yuri have known each other for years, she’s his best friend, there are things she knows about him that people would pay millions to hear. Even so, she’s so rarely disapproving. Stern, yes. Angry, all the time. But the frown that she gives him hits deeper than he’d like to admit, and Yuri finds it hard to meet her gaze. 

“Yuri,” Mila says, “I know you and that’s the last place that you need to be.” 

Because she knows he’ll skate out his frustration until he can’t feel his feet anymore. Yuri doesn’t even try to hide it. 

“Not tonight,” she says. “Just… go home tonight. The rink will still be there in the morning.”

It’s a good idea, so Yuri agrees. 

It’s a long train ride home full of odd stares that linger on the wooden box he cradles carefully in his lap. Even with sunglasses, a hat, and a scarf pulled tightly around his neck, he’s still recognizable. 

Not everyone is dumb enough to approach him though. The news has spread and they know what he’s dealing with, so they shoot him looks of sympathy from afar. Others have no tact, which is how the paparazzi are when he steps out of the station. 

“Mr. Plisetsky! What are your plans for the holidays in the wake of your grandfather’s passing?” The reporter is a greasing looking man with a notepad in his head, eyes shining at the prospect of catching a scoop. 

Yuri shoots him the finger in response. It’s been a while since he’s been so aggressively rude and Yakov will give him hell for it, but at the moment it feels good and right. For a moment, Yuri feels like his old self. 

When he gets home, he lights the fireplace that he never uses because Grandpa loved the smell of cedarwood burning. Then he places the urn on the mantel directly above. Yuri hates how it looks. But. 

He sighs, running his hand across the smooth wood of the shelf. It wasn’t so much that Yuri and his grandfather went out and did things together, it was usually the opposite. Sitting around the house and watching bad soaps on the television. Making pierogi together and sitting by the fire with folding trays as they eat. 

Just sitting together in general, the calm silence settling over them as Grandpa hummed lightly in his rocking chair. 

“Welcome home, Grandpa,” Yuri says. The urn doesn’t do Grandpa justice, he thinks, too simple and plain, just an oak box with white pine inlays. Grandpa requested it though. 

“Glad you’re here.” It’s the first thing he’s truly meant in what feels like years. 

Yuri makes it another two hours before he breaks his promise to Mila, grabs his skate bag, and sneaks into the rink for a midnight skate. It’s not a practice, he doesn’t run drills or work on techniques. Instead, he skates old routines, letting his mind fall blank as his body takes over.

Sometimes it’s smooth, sometimes it’s stilted, but Yuri doesn’t have to think as he circles around the rink. 

“Yurotchka,” Grandpa said once when Yuri was a child, “if you don’t know what to do, go back to your roots.”

Yuri’s never understood it until now, and for a small moment, as he flies across the ice, he feels like he might be okay. It isn’t until he stumbles his way through his last Olympic routine that he comes to a decision. He stands there in his finishing stance, chest heaving and legs burning. 

“I’ll sell it,” Yuri says to himself. His heart twists at the idea, memories of his childhood filling him as he stands there, toepick shoved deep into the ice. “It’s the best thing to do.”

He wishes the decision felt better and he wonders if Grandpa will be angry. Yuri pauses at the thought. _Would_ be angry, he then thinks. The sigh Yuri lets loose is felt down to his gut.

#

Yakov is looking at Yuri like he can see right through him, arms crossed over his chest and mouth tipped into an annoyed frown. Yuri winces on instinct when he comes to a stop, spraying ice everywhere. There are varying degrees of that particular look, but it’s been several years since Yuri’s seen this one; the last time was when he’d stumbled from a hotel room after a two-day bender with a cute Korean hockey skater that he doesn’t even remember the name of. 

Wild times.

“Yuri,” Yakov says from off the ice. Yuri can’t see it from this side of the barrier, but he knows that his coach is tapping his foot in annoyance. “Run it again.”

So, Yuri does. He does his best to try and ease through his routine but he loses his momentum at the end of an element, turning a triple axel into a double. Yuri can feel the burn of Yakov’s disapproval from twenty meters away. 

He knows that Yakov’s not happy but there isn’t anyone angrier than himself, so Yuri goes again. He sticks the triple but trips during the step sequence, barely catching himself. 

And again. Flubs the jump before ending at an odd angle during a camel spin. 

Again. Yuri damn near smacks into Mila because he’s too distracted to notice he’s lost his line while doing an edge pull. Mila isn’t angry, but Yuri lets out a frustrated yell, pulling himself from where he’s sprawled across the ice, barking at her for being in the way. 

“Watch it, hag!” he snaps, startling no one on the ice. Mila opens her mouth to retort, but Yakov beats her to it.

“Yuri!” Yakov yells. Yuri pauses before turning to him; Yakov never yells. He’s the grumpy sort of man who rarely passes out a compliment, but he doesn’t yell. “Off the ice. Go cool off.”

“No, I’m going again,” Yuri says. 

“Off the ice,” Yakov repeats firmly, and it only makes Yuri want to push back harder. 

“I—”

“Get out.”

Yuri’s rages, spouting things that he’d never dare yell while at practice. His rink mates know he’s an angry, ticking time bomb, but they’ve never seen him so furious. He calls Yakov every expletive he can think of, punctuating his words with rude gestures and even ruder follow-ups. 

And the worst part is that Yakov doesn’t blink, doesn’t even twitch a muscle. He just stands there as Yuri flings every insult that crosses his mind. And when he finishes, Yuri thought he’d feel better but he doesn’t; instead, he feels tired and weary, like he’s lost the last tiny shred of drive that’s barely kept him going. 

The other skaters stare in shocked silence. Mila looks resigned and Yakov— Well, Yakov doesn’t look remotely surprised, entirely unbothered. Not even red in the face. They all wait to see what Yuri does next which is the last thing any of them expect. 

“I quit,” Yuri says. 

“What—” Mila starts, but she can’t seem to find words, falling into stunned silence instead. 

“I quit,” Yuri repeats, bending over to unlace his skates right there in the middle of the ice. “I’m sick of this, I’m sick of skating, I’ve fucking hated it for years.” He strips off his skate and throws it to the floor, leaving tiny cracks in its wake. “I don’t want to wake up in the morning but I do, and I come here. I don’t want to train, but I do because it’s the only fucking thing that I know. And in the end, it was okay because I at least had Grandpa, and at least he’d be proud.”

The other boot comes off and joins the first, leaving Yuri standing awkwardly in his thick woolen socks. He doesn’t care about the way the others look at him like he’s gone mad, or the shock of cold up to his knees from standing on the ice. 

“So, you want me to cool off? Fine, I will then. Permanently.” When Yuri stomps off the ice, no one follows. When he packs his locker, he’s alone. It isn’t until he’s nearly out the damn front door there’s a hand on his shoulder. 

Yuri doesn’t expect Yakov. He waits for his former coach to lay down the law and tell him to get back on the ice. 

Instead, he says, “I’m proud of you. Mila’s proud of you, all of your teammates are proud of you. Your country is proud of you.”

Yuri feels the burn of tears pricking his eyes and he hates it. “It doesn’t matter,” he says, “I feel like nothing matters anymore. It hasn’t for a long time.”

Yakov sighs, squeezing his shoulder and at first, it feels like a cheap imitation of his grandfather. But then Yuri remembers that this is Yakov, a man who’s always been in his wheelhouse even when he was a child. Who saw something in a nobody and didn’t take a cent from them until Yuri won not his first or second competition, but his third. 

He’s not Grandpa, but he’s still someone important and Yuri’s been wholly unfair to him as well. 

“Take some time off,” Yakov says. “Do something for yourself, Yuri. You deserve it.”

“I was serious about quitting,” Yuri says and it’s like years of hesitation just slide right off of him. 

“I know,” Yakov says. “I know, Yuri.” His voice is quiet and understanding, and suddenly, Yuri feels like the world’s biggest jackass. He should’ve told him this years ago, Yakov would have listened. 

“Go. Get some rest. Do some thinking and when you’re ready, give me a call. We’ll talk.”

It hits him at that moment, how lucky Yuri is to have someone like Yakov. And Mila. He feels guilty. “Tell Mila that I’m sorry,” Yuri says. 

Yakov lets out a gruff little chuckle. “You made your bed, the least you can do is lie in it.” Because they both know that Mila will wring his neck the moment he sees her again. But only after she gives Yuri a much-needed hug. 

Yuri has a car but he hates driving, so he takes the railway instead even though public transport can be an annoyance. The train is quiet, though, and he gets a little reprieve. The few people riding alongside don’t even give him a second glance. He uses the time to think as he watches Moscow slide by in a blur. 

“Go to the inn,” Mila said to him. He’d hated the idea at the time. Part of him wants to just sell the place and never think of it again, but the rest of him resents the thought of it. Even the selling part of it. He’d like to see the place one last time, he thinks, it’s probably worth bitter memories in the end. 

When he gets home he packs a bag. Turtlenecks, designer jeans, and thick woolen socks. There isn’t really a plan, just get up and go. Yuri has no idea what to expect when he gets there. Most likely take one look, turn around, and immediately leave since running away from his problems seems on-brand for him these days. 

Yuri sleeps like shit and wakes up feeling worse. This is a mistake, he thinks, but he still gets dressed and shoulders his bag. He forgoes breakfast knowing it’ll be hard to keep down with such a sour feeling settling deep in his gut.

He’s about to go for the door when something catches his eye, punching the breath out of him. Grandpa’s armchair sits by the fire, one of the few things delivered from the retirement home. And across the wingback are his grandfather’s scarf and hat, draped there as if they’d just been dropped. Yuri doesn’t remember putting them there.

He wonders if Grandpa wants to see the inn one last time as well. 

Yuri drops his suitcase and pulls it open, pulling his clothing aside. This is the dumbest thing he’s ever considered doing but it feels right. He grabs his grandfather from the hearth, fingers smoothing over the wooden box. Then, he tucks the box into the bottom of his luggage, wrapping it carefully in one of his shirts. 

He stands, fingers wrapped around the handle of the case and then he pauses again. He hesitates for a moment before reaching out and picking up the scarf on the armchair. “‘Cause it’s cold out there,” Yuri says, wrapping it around his neck. Then he slips on the newsie cap, coiling up his hair and tucking it up into the worn-out wool. 

If he closes his eyes he can just barely smell Grandpa, comfort settling around him. Yuri hasn’t felt such peace in a long time so he relishes it. And when he finally leaves his apartment behind, key slipping in and locking it shut, there’s a little moment of excitement.

And then it’s gone, replaced with dread.

But it was a moment even if only a small one and that alone means everything because it shows that Yuri is capable of moving on. It surprises him because he’s a creature of habit. He’ll go and get some rest and do some thinking. Yuri’s never been one for self-reflection but this time he’s looking forward to it. Just some peace, moments for himself. 

Sounds nice.

**_Elsewhere_ **

The news of Nikolai’s passing hits him harder than expected. 

At first, he considers taking the day off. But then he doesn’t, slipping into the worn-down house just like he does every day. He’s pulled down a few walls and framed up new ones. There are sheetrock and plaster on standby for when he feels like doing lighter work. 

Instead, he takes his frustration out on the kitchen cabinets, sledgehammering them to splinters, pulling them from their brackets on the wall. He hadn’t been planning on replacing these, but--

Might as well. 

When he’s done, he’s tired and sweaty, covered in grime and dust. He feels a little bit better. And a little bit heartbroken. Nikolai was a one-of-a-kind man, one who’d taken a chance on him when no-one else would. 

There’d been a letter delivered with simple words. 

_My grandson might come. Keep up the good work._ _Thank you in advance. -Nikolai_

He heaves a heavy sigh and declares his day done. He doesn’t lock the door because it doesn’t work, not that anyone would mess with the place. _Snow and Bone_ is a beloved spot in this village, even if it’s been broken and bruised for a half-decade. 

He turns to give it one last look before leaving for the night, oddly in love with the building’s slight lean to the right. "Charm and character," Nikolai once told him. 

Otabek will miss him. 

But, he’ll keep his word. 

“Tomorrow, then,” he says, before turning down toward the path.

  
  
  



	2. II

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Otabek,” the man says. 
> 
> Yuri pauses at the threshold of the room, one hand pressed against the frame of the hallway. “What?” he asks rather indelicately. 
> 
> “My name. It’s Otabek.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So yeah, I was supposed to update this every few days about a month ago, but things irl happened. But never fear! Everything's been handled and I'm back to the grind.

“What the actual fuck.”

Yuri hasn’t visited Losta since before Grandpa moved away, but he remembers what the inn looks like. Or used to look like. He frowns; the dilapidated mess that stands before him is an absolute eyesore. 

The shingles on the roof are crooked, nearly falling off. There’s only one window on the ground floor that’s still even there, the glass spiderwebbed with cracks. The rest are boarded up. The left half of the porch steps are caved in, and the wrap-around beyond them is sagging in spots. The old porch swing has fallen off its chains, laying on the ground in a heap. 

Grandpa would be fucking appalled. 

Yuri doesn’t know what to do. He’s been left the place and selling it is the obvious choice, but this throws a wrench into his plans. It’s not that he can’t afford to renovate it, it’s that he doesn’t want to deal with it. He’s too busy, he’s got his training, he’s--

He’s already forgotten that he’s quit skating entirely. Yuri bites at his lip. So really, he doesn’t have much of an excuse. Maybe he can sell it as-is, let whoever buys it deal with the aftermath, but the moment he thinks it the thought sours. 

No, _no,_ he can’t. The inn’s been left to him, the least he can do is fix the place up before offloading it. He owes it to Grandpa.

“Looks like a lot of work,” Yuri says to himself. “Too much fucking work.”

The door’s unlocked, but Losta is small enough that Yuri knows the place is undisturbed. This is the kind of village where people leave their doors unlocked at night; everyone knows each other and each other’s grandmas and who you’ve dated for the last four years. 

The inside isn’t too terrible, considering. There’s still furniture covered in tarps and blankets. The floor is covered in sawdust. Some walls have been knocked down and framed back up, so maybe Grandpa had done a little work. 

“Must’ve kicked the bucket before it finished,” Yuri muses, covering his pain with humor. It only half-works. 

He soon learns there’s no working electricity, though, and the tap water comes out brown at first, sediment having settled in the pipes from disuse. Yuri sighs, resigning himself to wash in a bucket of water from the well the next day. If it isn’t frozen over. 

It’s already late in the day and Yuri is tired. There’s the beginning of holiday happenings around the village, but all he wants to do is take a nap, so he hauls himself up the stairs to a familiar room that was never rented out. 

This room hasn’t been touched, preserved by time, and covered in dust. Posters of skaters and tigers frame the walls, a few stuffed animals tucked into various corners and the quilt his Grandma made thrown over the twin bed, tucked neatly into the corners. 

The first thing Yuri does is open his suitcase and pull Grandpa out, placing him in the windowsill. It’s dumb to think that a wooden box would even care, but Yuri turns it to look at the winter wonderland outside, covered in tree trimmings and lights and snow. 

Then, Yuri drops onto the bed, not even bothering to beat it clean. The dust tickles his nose and the pillow smells a little like mold, but his eyes slip closed before he can think anything more of it. 

Maybe it’s the comfort of home or some weird bullshit like that, but it’s the first decent sleep he’s had in months. 

#

Yuri wakes to the sound of someone rummaging around in the kitchen. 

Fight or flight kicks in and he’s high alert on instinct, snapping up in bed and ready to fight. He doesn’t bother with slipping on his shoes, tiptoeing out of his childhood room and down the stairs in only his socks. They creak under his weight and he bites back a curse.

Whoever is in the kitchen pauses, having heard the sound. Hesitates. Then goes back to their pilfering. 

As Yuri passes by the old cane stand, he grabs one, fingers smoothing over the weathered wood and the carved raven handle. Grandpa always liked this one because ravens were his favorite type of bird. 

He turns the corner to find a man in the kitchen. Or what used to be the kitchen; the place is beyond a mess, nearly everything ripped out aside from the antique wood-burning stove. His foe is short, barely five-foot-seven, but the hammer he wields puts Yuri and his cane at a disadvantage. Still, Yuri towers over him and looks a fright. Maybe the man will run off on his own, having not expected someone to be there. 

The intruder doesn’t, looking utterly baffled instead as they stand there and stare at each other.

“What are you doing here?” Yuri snaps, calmer than he thought manageable. He’s always been good under pressure but this isn’t the same as skating on an international platform, billions of eyes watching. 

“Working,” the man says as though it were obvious, brown eyes blinking slowly. He’s handsome and stupidly muscular, entirely Yuri’s type. Even if he’s short, Yuri can work around that. 

Yuri blinks at the thought. How can he consider boning the man who’s broken into his grandfather’s inn? His dry spell must be hitting him harder than he initially thought. 

“Look, put the hammer down and I’ll call the cops without bashing your head in, yeah?”

The man looks from Yuri’s face to the glorified wooden stick in his hand. “With a cane?”

“I’m stronger than I look.” The man then looks to the twenty-pound sledge in his hand and quirks an eyebrow. Yuri swallows. “Okay, so maybe I’m at a disadvantage, but you’re the one who’s broken in.”

“The door was open,” the man says. “Lock’s been broken for nearly a year and I just haven’t fixed it yet. Other priorities.”

“Other priorities— what does that even mean?”

The man grunts. “I told you, I’m _working.”_

“Look, little man,” Yuri says, “this is my Grandpa’s inn and I’m telling you to get the fuck out—”

“Grandpa?”

Yuri hesitates and then says, because he’s not entirely without manners, “Yes.”

“You’re the grandson.” Not a question, but an observation. 

“Wait, you knew my grandfather?”

“He hired me.” Then the man’s gaze turns shrewd. “You didn’t know?”

Okay, so this makes a lot more sense, Yuri thinks. “So, if I put this cane down, you won’t attack me that hammer, right?”

The man snorts. “You’re the one that interrupted my work,” he says, as though that explains anything. Yuri shoots him a look, causing the man to sigh. “I swear to you, the hammer will stay over here.”

“But in your hand,” Yuri says warily. 

“In my hand,” the man confirms, “because I’ve got work to do and daylight’s wasting.”

“It’s nine in the morning.”

“And the sun sets at four.”

The man isn’t wrong; it’s the beginning of December and Russia gets about seven hours of sunlight if they’re lucky. But Yuri can be a dick when pressed, so he says, “What, no lights?”

“Electricity's be turned off for several years. I’ve been running tools of the generator.” That sounds terrible and Yuri’s perversely pleased that this man’s had difficulty in his job. Which, speaking of:

“What did Grandpa hire you for?”

The man’s already gone back to work, pulling out the smashed remnants of kitchen cabinetry. He pauses and looks back at Yuri like he’s the dumbest man alive. Yuri takes offense to that. 

“To fix this place up, obviously. I assumed he was planning on reopening it.”

Yuri blinks. “He’d been living in a retirement home for the last six years.”

The man shrugs. “He’d warned me you might come by. I assumed that’s why.”

“I didn’t even know he still had this place,” Yuri says. “I thought he sold it years ago. I’m too busy to deal with it.”

“Deal with it,” the man says, sounding rather annoyed. He yanks at a piece a wood aggressively and it comes away with part of the wall. Yuri makes a mental note to not piss him off because he doesn’t want to be on the opposite side of those bulging muscles. 

Actually, that’s wrong, he won’t mind it under entirely different circumstances. Yuri throws the idea out as soon as it comes because the last thing that he needs right now is messy casual sex that will lead absolutely nowhere. He’s got bigger problems. 

“So what, you just… come here and work on it? By yourself?”

“That’s the job.”

“Why you?”

“A question I often asked him. Never really gave me an answer, just said I was the obvious choice.”

Yuri frowns; that sounds exactly like something Grandpa would say. When he looks up, the man is staring at him again, hammer resting across his broad shoulders. 

“Do you want to see documentation or something? I’ve got permits.”

Yuri is fairly certain that the man is an actual contractor and not a looter, because who goes about ripping out cabinets for fun? He didn’t look around much the day before, but Yuri knows that the stuff of value is either still there, covered in sheets with care, or packed up in storage. 

“No, I—” Yuri sighs, resigned. “Look, I’m sorry that I came in looking for a fight. I honestly wasn’t expecting anyone to be here. My grandfather didn’t exactly have a chance to explain things.”

The man’s face falls slightly in sympathy, understanding. Yuri hasn’t had a lot of time to grieve, nor has he allowed himself to, so he’s thankful when the contractor doesn’t push any further. 

“The job is simple,” the man says. “I come here every day and I work until I’m done. Every day’s a little different but the goal is the same.”

“What what exactly is the goal?” Yuri asks. 

The man looks around the room, taking in everything around them before turning back to Yuri, his expression weirdly fond. “To give it life. Nikolai’s words, not mine.” He pauses. “Well, actually, he said something about giving it back it’s charm.”

Yuri doesn’t quite smile, but there is a slight quirk to his lips at that. 

“Yurotchka,” his grandfather once said when Yuri called the house ugly, “it’s not about how it looks, it’s about the charm it holds. Even the ugliest thing can capture the attention of another.”

A nice sentiment, Yuri thinks, especially for someone as ugly as he is. “Right then, I’ll just stay out of your way then,” he eventually says. “Go uh, about your business.”

The man cocks his head to the side, regarding him quietly. Yuri turns to leave, suddenly uncomfortable with all of it; the house, this man, Grandpa’s wishes. 

Coming here was a mistake, Yuri tells himself, he’d known it from the moment he’d made the choice. He expects the contractor to poke and pry because he’s obviously curious, but he doesn’t. 

“Otabek,” the man says. 

Yuri pauses at the threshold of the room, one hand pressed against the frame of the hallway. “What?” he asks rather indelicately. 

“My name. It’s Otabek.”

Yuri meets his gaze, surprised at how serious Otabek looks in return. Determined, even, if Yuri doesn’t know any better. He’s not very good at reading people because he’s never really tried. It’s easier to just hold them an arm’s length away instead. 

“Yuri,” he says because it’s the proper thing to do. Aside from that, he doesn’t really care. “Not that it matters. I won’t be here long.”

Otabek frowns at that, his jaw tightening the tiniest bit, but he doesn’t say more. And, all Yuri does is nod before he finally leaves the kitchen and all the brewing memories behind. 

#

Yuri wakes the next morning coming to another decision. 

He isn’t surprised to find Otabek already in the house. Otabek seems serious and stern, the kind of man to rouse right at dawn. Yuri finds him in the kitchen just like the day before, halfway into a hole on the wall, fiddling with the wiring. 

Otabek hears Yuri walk in but doesn’t look up. “Metal cased wiring,” he says, as though Yuri will even understand. “I mean, I’m not really surprised given the age of this house. It was probably wired in the twenties and—”

“I’m selling the house,” Yuri cuts in. 

Otabek pulls out of the wall, fingers curled around a section of frayed electrical cords. Yuri knows nothing about wiring but even he can tell that it’s a disaster waiting to happen, solidifying his decision that this is the right idea. 

“Selling it,” Otabek says. “I was under the impression that you were going to keep it.”

Yuri frowns. “Did my grandfather tell you that? I don’t know why he would, he knows that I don’t have time to run this place.” Yuri stops abruptly, not because he remembers that he’s quit skating, but because Grandpa’s dead. One’s easier to remember than the other but glazed with a thin veil of denial. “Knew,” Yuri continues. “He knew I didn’t have the time.”

Yuri hates the look of sympathy that Otabek gives him, tired of people pitying him. 

“It isn’t my place to tell you what to do,” Otabek says. 

“Good, because my mind is set.”

Otabek hesitates, mouth parted, and then says, “But, if I may offer advice—”

“You don’t need to keep on working,” Yuri cuts in. 

“I’ve been working on this house for nearly half a year,” Otabek says. “It’s a labor of love at this point.”

Yuri looks around them. “There’s still so much to do and I can’t wait until it’s done.”

“This place has been sitting here, alone, for nearly six years.”

Otabek has him there but Yuri isn’t sure why he’s so adamant about maintaining the job, so he tries another tactic. “I can’t afford to pay you.”

Yuri absolutely can, but that’s beside the point. Maybe Otabek has no idea he is because he’s never seen his face plastered all over the world. Judging by the way Otabek’s gaze cools slightly, though, he knows exactly who Yuri is. Surprisingly, Otabek’s never brought it up. And, even more surprisingly, he still doesn’t.

Instead, he says, “Your grandfather paid me up front.”

Yuri blinks at that. “Wait, what—”

“So, seeing as I’ve been paid, I’m planning on finishing the work.”

Yuri hesitates before saying, “I’m still selling the place.” Otabek hums at that, turning back to the fraying bits of wire in his hands. “And, I’m not staying here long,” Yuri continues. 

Otabek doesn’t look at him, pulling apart the metal casing that surrounds the wires to get a better look. “I’d think about it.”

“Think about what?”

“Selling this place.” Otabek drops the wires and stands properly, stretching his back. “Like I said, it’s not my place to tell you what to do but there isn’t a need to rush anything. Think about it while I finish this place up. There’s a lot of work left to do and you don’t have to feel pressured into it.”

“I’m not pressured into this,” Yuri says, but the moment he does, the words feel strained. Otabek, to his credit, doesn’t say anything further. “What’s it to you anyway? Isn’t this just a job to you?”

There’s something about the way that Otabek pauses, face turning fond as he looks around the room. He reaches out, pressing a hand against the wall. Yuri’s grandmother loved that hideous wallpaper. 

“I made a promise,” Otabek says simply, “that I’d do this place justice.” Yuri has the distinct feeling that there’s probably more to whatever deal Otabek struck with Grandpa, but he doesn’t want to think about it anymore. 

Yuri crosses his arms across his chest stubbornly. “Fine then, keep working on this dump. I came out here for a vacation, so don’t expect any help.”

Yuri watches Otabek for a long moment, mouth tugged into a frown. Otabek has a soft spot for this place and clearly knew his grandfather better than he was letting on. Part of him wonders if he should be concerned, but more than anything, Yuri’s just too tired to care much further. 

He’ll find a buyer, Otabek will fix this place up and then Yuri can wipe his hands clean of this place once and for all. 

But, like Otabek, there’s still a little bit of fondness for this place, from the tilted lean of the foundation to the ugly-ass yellow-gold and floral wallpaper his grandmother loved. Even the old furniture and random knick-knacks left behind, piled under dust sheets. 

Like everything else in his life, Yuri will move past his hesitation and onto something else. Eventually. 

“Don’t expect any help from me,” Yuri says with finality. 

Otabek, who’d gone back to inspecting the wiring, looks up. “Wouldn’t dream of it,” he says, mouth twisting into a crooked little smile. He’s got a dimple in his left cheek, and Yuri thinks for a moment that he’s handsome.

Which annoys him because that’s not why he’s come here. And it’s not why Otabek’s here either. Yuri huffs and turns away, intent on pushing the idea out of his mind. He’d come to Losta for some peace, not to nail the ass of some poor, unsuspecting contractor. 

And, let it be known that while Yuri is a lot of things, he’s first and foremost a man of his word.

#

So, it turns out that Otabek is hard to ignore.

Several days after trying to fire him, Yuri comes home to a functioning boiler, warming the rooms to a toasty delight. 

“You complained about the blankets,” Otabek says simply, coming up from the basement covered in grease and a thin sheen of sweat. Yuri swallows at the sight. “Oh, and, I got those washed as well. My sister kindly picked them up and laundered them. And some bedsheets.”

“I can do my own laundry,” Yuri snaps at him, but all Otabek does is raise an eyebrow. 

“Can you though? Cause you haven’t.” Yuri opens his mouth to retort, but Otabek beats him to it. “Water’s connected now. The washer is shitty cause it’s hooked to a generator and the dryer won’t work, but there’s plenty of room to hang up anything you wash.”

“Er, thanks?”

“Would you rather my sister keep washing your things?” Otabek asks, a little amused.

_“No—”_

“Good, because she said it was a one-time deal.” Otabek takes a rag out of his pocket and wipes across his brow, only smearing the grime he’s covered in. “In any case, you’ve got heating now too. Electricity’s going to take a lot longer to fix because this entire place needs to be rewired, but the boiler wasn’t much of an issue. Mostly needed to be cleaned out and reset.”

“So I’ve got heat,” Yuri says. 

“Eh,” Otabek says, looking away, looking a little awkward. He must not be used to doing things for people like this, and it’s a little endearing. “There’s a storm coming, expecting several feet of snow. Didn’t want you holed up in here half-frozen.”

“Grandma’s quilts are plenty warm,” Yuri says, “but, thank you.” It comes a little flat but it’s genuine.

Otabek’s demeanor softens a little at that. “You aren’t used to giving gratitude are you?”

“Hey—”

“I didn’t mean that you aren’t ever thankful.”

Yuri lets out a sigh. “I don’t have a lot of time to thank people.”

Otabek hums at that. “All that skating, I assume.” It’s the first mention of who Yuri is and what he does for a living. Or did, rather.

“Yeah, I guess.”

Otabek watches him for a moment, looking like he wants to say something thoughtful. But then he decides against it and says instead, “I tried to hook up the fridge to the generator but it just shorted out. It’s decades-old, so no surprise. The cellar’s cold enough to keep food, though.”

Grandma used to make Yuri haul things out of the cellar as part of his chores when he was a kid, and he can’t help but cringe. Otabek laughs at his expression, a gentle and soft sound that Yuri’s not sure he’d actually heard at first. 

That night, his childhood room is warm and comforting, and Yuri digs deep into the soft mattress and fresh-smelling quilts. It’s the first night that he sleeps without much issue, not due to tiredness or exhaustion, but because he’s comfortable. 

Yuri hasn’t been comfortable in years. 

#

Otabek is kind and quiet. He slips into the inn near sunrise every day, does his work without complaint, and is gone right before sundown. Yuri is surprised to find an easy friendship with him because at first, he goes out of his way to avoid him. 

Then, a week after his arrival, Otabek brings him coffee, black with just a little whole milk, and that terrible fake hazelnut syrup. Yuri’s lifeblood, truly. 

“I guessed,” Otabek says to him, pushing the to-go cup into his hand. Yuri doubts it because every interview he’s given in the last decade has reported what his favorite drink is. 

Still, it’s the thought that counts, and Yuri tucks it away with a very real smile which prompts Otabek to give him one back in kind. And that makes Yuri a little more than interested, unable to keep away. 

Damn the contractor and the cute little dimple that’s neatly tucked into the left side of his mouth. 

“So, I might need your help today,” Otabek says, leaning against the kitchen wall as he sips at his own drink. 

Yuri gives him a mock glare. “I knew there was a reason for bringing me this. A bribe.”

“I prefer to call it a peace offering.”

“It’s still a bribe.”

“Tender for work received, then,” Otabek says diplomatically, his tone so serious that Yuri bursts into laughter. They both freeze and things fall a little awkward because Yuri isn’t the kind of man that laughs like that. Even at funny jokes. 

Otabek clears his throat and breaks the silence with, “Nothing big, I just need an extra set of hands. The new cabinets are coming in and I just need help moving them around.”

“You pulled them out easily enough,” Yuri says.

“Because I took a sledge to them. Cabinets are easy to move by yourself when they’re in pieces.”

Yuri starts at that, cocking his head to the side. “Pieces? What pissed you off so much that you took it out on the cabinetry?”

Otabek doesn’t answer, suddenly looking uncomfortable. 

“You don’t have to explain—”

“No, it’s fine,” Otabek cuts in. “Honestly, it’s not a big deal.”

“Still,” Yuri says, “I get not wanting to… share.”

Otabek lets out a long sigh and sets his cup down on an overturned box that serves as their makeshift table. The proper dining one is folded up against the wall in the den. “Sometimes, you just have to let loose that rage.”

Yuri waits until the cabinets are delivered and they’ve hauled half of them into their new homes. He’s grimy and covered in dust, sweat stinging his eyes. Otabek drills the cabinet into place and Yuri pulls back. 

“I skate,” he says abruptly. Otabek looks at him confused, wiping at his own gritty face with an equally dirty rag. It doesn’t do much. “When I’m angry,” Yuri continues. “I can’t afford to go around smashing things, so I skate it out. Old routines usually, the ones with aggressive music always work the best.”

“Does it work?” Otabek asks him.

Yuri considers saying yes, but something makes him pause and think about the question seriously. “No. Not usually. But, it’s better than nothing.” Otabek looks anywhere but Yuri’s face as he considers this. Yuri asks, “What about you? Did smashing cabinets work?”

Otabek’s mouth twitches slightly into a soft, sad little quirk. “No,” Otabek says, “because it couldn’t change anything.”

“Worst part of living,” Yuri says. “When shit gets bad there’s so little you can do.”

“Is that why you’re here?” Otabek asks. Yuri’s been expecting this question but he’s somewhat thankful that it’s taken Otabek a week to ask. Otabek isn’t the type to pry and it puts Yuri at ease. 

“I’m here because I don’t know what to do.”

Otabek is quiet for a moment and then he says, “Still selling the place?”

“Gotta,” Yuri says, but the more that he says it the less he believes it, and the more that he wonders if it’s true. 

They declare their little break over and start with the cabinets again. They heft them into place one by one, Yuri bracing the frame while Otabek drills them into place. It’s an easy pattern of hard labor that Yuri winds up liking. The day passes in the blink of an eye and before he knows it, it’s nearing sunset. They’d installed most of them, save one. Not bad for a hard day’s work. 

“It was your grandfather,” Otabek says as they survey their work. 

Yuri turns to him, frowning. “What?”

“What made me angry. It was his passing.”

“Yeah, I’m pretty pissed that he kicked the bucket without asking me first.” Yuri means for it to be lighthearted but he can tell that it weighs heavily on the both of them. So, he chances an observation. “You knew him pretty well, didn’t you?”

“He was a good friend,” Otabek says. “Took a chance on me and my work. Who pays to reno an entire house upfront?”

“Who indeed?” Yuri says dryly. But then he motions around them. “Still, seems like Grandpa made the right choice. He was always good at reading people.”

“Yeah,” Otabek says, getting a sort of far-off look about him. 

“Tomorrow then?” Yuri asks. 

“Tomorrow,” Otabek confirms. “Actually, let’s make it a late day. Meet me at Deja Brew at nine.”

Yuri groans. “Nine? You call that late?”

Otabek raises an eyebrow. “I said let’s make it a late workday. I rise with the sun.”

“I hate it.”

“Habit.”

Yuri reaches out to punch him across the shoulder playfully and Otabek laughs. Yuri doesn’t need to confirm that he’ll be there, they both know that he will be. Not like he has anything else to do with his day aside from calling real estate agents. 

Which, Yuri’s been putting off, telling himself that he’s too tired for such commitment. He’ll get to it soon. 

Otabek grabs a broom and sweeps up. Yuri helps toss debris and garbage into a pile on the lawn to be burned at the end of the week. Then, Otabek puts his handtools their canvas home, rolling it up and tying it shut. The power tools stay, tucked neatly into a bucket in the corner. They turn off the generator and Otabek shoulders his pack. 

“Yeah, yeah,” Yuri says when Otabek pauses at the door. “Tomorrow.”

“Dress warmly. There’s a front coming in.”

“Who are you, my grandfather?” Grandpa always complained that Yuri wasn’t ever bundled up enough. 

Otabek doesn’t say anything, just gifts him a soft smile in return. Yuri hates the way that it makes his gut flutter, but he hates the loss of Otabek’s presence in the house more.

#

The coffee shop is a cute little place despite its fucking terrible name. Yuri slips into the warm space from the blistering cold. As promised, he’d bundled up, but he knows that his nose burns red and his fingers are frozen solid. 

Otabek’s already there, tucked into a soft and worn looking armchair in the corner, reading a newspaper. 

“The news?” Yuri jeers when he steps closer. “The old man you are is starting to show.”

“I’m only a few years older than you,” Otabek says with a frown.

“Still, in your thirties.”

“Barely. I’m thirty-one and in my prime.”

Yuri hums at that, pretending to scrutinize him and Otabek rolls his eyes in return. “I bear gifts,” Yuri says, dropping a paper bag onto the table. Otabek eyes it warily. “Sushki. Some old lady dropped them off, I think she’s a neighbor? Didn’t say much aside from yelling at me to put on weight.” Yuri snorts at that. 

“Zoya,” Otabek says. “Sounds like her. She gives me food to help me grow taller.”

“And how’s that working for you?” Yuri asks, dropping into the armchair next to Otabek. 

“I think I’m nearing one hundred and seventy-five centimeters,” Otabek says with humor. They both know he’s not anywhere near that. 

“You _are_ stupidly short,” Yuri says, “For such a built dude.”

“Gotta have shape somewhere,” Otabek says with a shrug. Yuri wishes that had the confidence that Otabek does. It’s not that Yuri is unhappy with his appearance, it’s just that he’s always been described as slim and graceful, or dainty, or fairy-like. Yuri’s near one hundred and eighty-three centimeters and even if he’s graceful, doesn’t like being compared to fairies even if he’s a glittering, gay unicorn. 

Mila’s words, not his.

Otabek peeks into the paper bag and lets out a hum. “I bet Yuuri has some jam—”

“That I have what?” Yuri asks.

Otabek blinks. “Ah, sorry, not you. _Yuuri,”_ he repeats, stressing the name strangely. “He’s one of the owners here.”

“Did I hear my name?”

They turn to the right to find a Japanese man, short and a little stocky, but not unattractive. His dark hair hangs across his bangs and into his glasses, and he gives them a warm smile. “Tucking in this time, Otabek?” Yuuri’s Russian is deceptively good, with only the slightest hint of an accent.

“Making it a late workday,” Otabek says, as though it’s not only just past the crack of dawn. The sun’s been up for barely an hour and Yuri wants to groan in annoyance. “I was telling Yuri here that you might have some jam to go with these.” He points to the bag of pastries.

Yuuri looks between the two of them thoughtfully and Yuri decides right then and there, that he hates that look. Loathes it, even. 

“I might have something in the back. Victor’s got your coffee on the way.” Yuuri turns and walks away without another word. 

Yuri looks to Otabek, who looks back at him. “What?” Otabek asks.

“He stole my name!” 

Otabek lets out a chuckle that sounds more like an awkward snort. “I’m pretty sure he’s older than you.”

“That doesn’t mean shit,” Yuri says, crossing his arms across his chest and sinking into the chair. And yeah, maybe he sounds like a petulant child, but he’s got one of the most common names in all of fucking Russia, he doesn’t need a foreigner to share it too. 

Otabek is still amused, hiding his snickering behind his hand.

“He speaks Russian well at least,” Yuri says honestly. 

“I think he’s lived here a long time,” Otabek says. “He runs this place with his husband.”

At that, Yuri’s eyes widen with surprise. “Husband—”

“Ah, Otabek! Taking your coffee here this morning?” Yuri turns to meet the face of an older, man with soft laugh lines around his face. His silver hair glints in the low light of the coffee shop and a wide smile is spread across his face. 

Otabek nods. “I thought I’d get Yuri out of the inn,” he says. 

The man’s mouth falls open, eyes glittering with excitement as he says, “Whaaa, Yuri?”

Yuri’s eyes narrow and his mouth pulls into a frown. “That’s my name.”

The other man’s lips then quirk into a knowing smirk. “Plisetsky,” he says and Yuri cringes. 

“Yeah, yeah, keep that quiet, okay? It’s bad enough that I can’t go anywhere without people knowing everything about me, okay?”

The man blinks and Otabek takes the cue for an introduction. “Yuri, this is Victor.”

“Victor,” Yuri confirms, not that he really gives a shit. He’s not likely to step foot in this place ever again. He’s the grab your coffee and leave immediately type. 

Victor flashes him a wide grin. “It’s so nice to put a face to a name. Nikolai talked about you a lot.”

Yuri wonders what he means by _put a face to the name,_ because there isn’t a person in Russia who doesn’t know who he is. His confusion must show on his face, because Victor says, “Ah, I mean, everyone looks different in person, no? You’re so much taller than expected, but then again, you’re quite a fierce skater.”

Fierce. Yuri blinks at that; he’s always touted as being graceful and swan-like, and even for a brief period in his late teens, _edgy._ But never fierce. “Um—”

“Well, your coffee then,” Victor cuts in, suddenly remembering the steaming mugs that he’s holding in his hands. He must have hands that can withstand lava, Yuri thinks, but it might be because he’s used to it. 

The same way that Yuri’s used to an ice rink, able to skate long practices in short-sleeves and leggings, even if it’s not advisable. 

“Victor.” It’s Yuuri, coming up to them with a small tray loaded with jam and knives. “Stop bothering them.”

“I’m not,” Victor pouts. “I was just saying that Nikolai often came by to talk about—” Yuuri shoots Victor a disappointed look and the man falls silent, swallowing thickly. “What I mean to say is—”

“You knew my grandfather?” Yuri asks, honestly curious. And yeah, it hurts to think about him, and he’s a little bitter that Victor knew him so well, but it wasn’t the man’s fault that he seems fond of the memories. Everyone loved Grandpa, Yuri included. 

Victor smiles gently, getting a small, far-off look in his eye. “Every morning like clockwork,” he says. “Hazelnut latte, made with whole milk. Wouldn’t take any other option.”

Yuri can believe it. “’Newfangled young-people milks’,” he quotes fondly. 

“That’s the phrase,” Victor says.

And Otabek just sits there quietly, watching Yuri with a curiously fond expression as he curls his fingers around his mug. Victor taps a finger against Yuri’s mug before sliding it across the table. 

“Yours isn’t much different.”

“I fucking hate steamed milk,” says Yuri. 

“But not the hazelnut,” says Victor with a wink. “And no, I didn’t hear that in an interview. Losta is excited to have you here, Yuri. It’s been far too long since Snow and Bone’s been out of commission. People miss it.”

“Well don’t get used to—”

“Soon we’ll have it back in tip-top shape,” Otabek cuts in, prompting Yuri to shoot him a nasty glare. Unlike most, it doesn’t seem to phase Otabek at all, something that annoys Yuri quite a bit.

Victor claps his hands once, cheering, and then leaves Otabek and Yuri to themselves, flitting away to take care of other patrons. 

Once he’s out of earshot, Yuri looks to Otabek again. “What was that? Getting his hopes up?”

“The inn’ll be up and running, no matter what you decide to do with it.”

“And if whoever buys it just tears it down?”

Otabek’s expression turns flinty at that. “No,” he says firmly. “No, you can’t let them.”

Yuri rolls his eyes, already annoyed with this topic. He came to Losta to wash his hands clean of an eyesore that he doesn’t even want, not to defend its honor. “That sounds like a lot of work, too much work for someone just breezing right through.”

“I promised him,” Otabek says quietly, hesitantly. “Your grandfather.”

“Promised him _what?”_

“That Snow and Bone wouldn’t go anywhere. That’s why he left it to you.” 

Yuri scoffs at that. “He knew better than to expect me to run the damn place. He knows how busy I am.”

“And yet, you’re here.”

“On vacation,” Yuri says stubbornly. Otabek doesn’t know the true extent of his little trip, or that he’s not exactly due back in Moscow anytime soon, but Yuri can at least try to spin it that way for as long as possible. 

“Vacation or not, he left it to you for a reason.”

Yuri let out a frustrated grunt. “This isn’t about me,” Yuri says stubbornly.

“It isn’t?” Otabek asks, staring right back. Yuri shivers slightly at the unnerving stare. It isn’t so much that it bothers him, it’s more that Otabek seems to see right through him. Sometimes, it feels like he’s seen right through him from the moment they first shared words. 

The worst part is that it’s not such a terrible thought. Yuri hates being perceived, hates when people can understand him so readily. But, for some reason, the idea of Otabek having an almost instinctual understanding of who Yuri is, isn’t so terrible.

It might even be welcome if the slow-burning heat that’s often felt in his gut is taken at face value.

Yuri sighs. “Look, it’s complicated,” he says. “That’s why I’m here, I guess.”

“A vacation, you said.”

Yuri laughs bitterly at that, staring straight into his mug of coffee. “I’ve got a lot going on,” he says. “Not just Grandpa, or the inn. I needed some time to myself, to sit and think, and to figure things out. I didn’t come here to relax, I came here to do a lot of critical soul-searching.”

“And how’s that going for you?” Otabek asks. There isn’t judgment in his voice, only genuine curiosity and maybe even a smidge of concern. 

Yuri’s knee-jerk response is to always dodge the question with a response that answers something else. It’s a tactic that he uses in interviews to avoid needlessly personal questions that he can’t afford to shut down outright— which he’s also known to do. But, there are times where he has to maintain a modicum of decorum, and vaguely dismissing an unwanted question by answering another has been his longtime go-to. 

He finds here though, that he doesn’t want to. Otabek’s been so honestly earnest with him and they’ve formed what seems like a genuine friendship, and Yuri finds that he wants to tell the truth for once in his goddamn life. 

“Not great,” Yuri says, and though his shoulders sag slightly in defeat, it’s like a heavy weight has been lifted from them. Despite his bleak and bleary future, he already feels better, if only for the moment. 

Otabek doesn’t immediately respond, instead, watching him quietly through soft eyes. He holds his mug aloft and takes a sip of it, allowing Yuri the moment. When Yuri doesn’t elaborate further, Otabek finally says, “Well, that’s the good thing about Losta. There’s not a lot going on here that’ll stress you out.”

“Except the inn,” Yuri grouses.

“Except the inn,” Otabek agrees. “But, it’s not an immediate problem. Let’s fix the place up and then worry about what you’ll do with it later.”

Yuri shoots him a defeated and tired look, weary of the mere thought of it. His Grandpa’s caused a lot of annoyance, saddling him with the decrepit money-pit. He’d known that Yuri would have a hard time letting it go. “Easy for you to say.”

“Yeah, it is.” Otabek’s unwavering and stoic honesty is a strange change of pace, but now that Yuri’s gotten used to it, he finds it refreshing. Expected, even. Valuable. And, the determined look that Otabek gets is strikingly handsome. “But, I’m also right.” He pauses to drain the last of his drink. “And you know it.”

Otabek’s right on both counts. “So, a problem to tackle later, then,” Yuri says. 

“It won’t be any easier to sell now than months down the road.”

“We’ll see about that.”

A sad flicker crosses Otabek’s face. “I’m still holding out on you changing your mind.”

“Don’t push your luck,” Yuri says, signature scowl spreading across his face. Instantly, he feels like himself again, not the pitiful shell that he’s become over the last few weeks.

“Already am,” Otabek says. “Your grandfather will definitely come back to haunt me from the grave if I don’t keep my promise.”

At that, Yuri bursts into laughter.

#

“So, you’re Yuri Plisetsky.”

Yuri looks up from the overgrown garden that he’s weeding to find a short, curvy woman with tanned, olive skin. Thick, brown hair curls around her face, half of it pulled back into a hasty little bun, and she’s dressed like she’s prepared for an actual blizzard, not some minor snowfall. 

Her eyes flash dangerously as she does him a once-over, gaze dropping from his face to his feet, before lifting again. “Definitely not impressive,” she says.

That causes Yuri to shoot to his feet, abrasive words already finding his tongue with little effort. “Now listen, I don’t give a shit who you are—”

“Otabek won’t shut the fuck up about you, so I guess I assumed that you’d really be something. Instead, I find a man who’s nothing but skin and bones, and those damn circles under your eyes.” She pauses. “Surely, you know what concealer is.”

Yuri’s mouth falls open at that. “Otabek?”

She lets out an annoyed little huff. “Who else?”

Yuri regards her through a shrewd little gaze. “Who are you?”

“Maya, of course,” she says as if it were the most obvious thing in the world. The only problem is that Yuri has no idea who _Maya_ is either. And when he tells her that, she lets out a frustrated grunt, stamping her foot on the ground. 

“Oh, for fuck’s sake,” she murmurs, and Yuri decides that he’s not sure that he likes this woman.

He changes his mind when she reveals the handmade manti in her brown paper bag. 

They lounge on the broken front porch, munching away at the snack. When Yuri asks if she made the food, Maya only laughs, citing that her only talent is with mixing drinks. 

“Honestly, put me in a kitchen and I’m more likely to burn the place down. That’s Otabek’s forte.”

Yuri’s eyebrows raise at this; he didn’t know that Otabek can cook. “So, you’re what, an ex-girlfriend?”

Maya stares at him, eyes entirely bugged out, sneering at the mere idea. “Oh, _oh, Allah,_ absolutely not. I’m his sister.” Now that Yuri thinks back, she’s been mentioned once or twice. Maya’s expression pinches slightly. “Does he really not talk about me?”

“Once,” Yuri says. “Twice.” He shrugs. “Little enough that I barely remembered.”

“Oh, I’m going to kill him,” Maya says.

“I’d prefer if you waited until after we finish fixing this place up. I’m not particularly handy with a hammer.”

“Only weeding gardens,” Maya says with a sly smile, gesturing to his dirt-stained clothing. They both know that he’s pretty terrible at that too.

“Look, I tried,” Yuri says.

“I’m sure that Otabek will appreciate it.” Maya gives him a strange, almost calculating look like she’s trying to decipher a puzzle. Yuri stares right back at her, refusing to budge an inch. 

“Speaking of my brother,” Maya asks, “where is he?”

“Mid-day coffee run.”

“Coffee? He doesn’t drink coffee in the afternoon.” Maya shoots him a disbelieving look.

“No,” Yuri says, “But I do.”

There’s that strange look across her face again, Maya caught somewhere halfway between and amused and mildly disgusted. Disgusted by what, Yuri can’t fathom. 

“Well, I’ll be gone before he comes back. I just wanted to drop this off and sneak a peek at you.”

“At me?” Yuri asks, “Why?”

“I already said it,” Maya says, “Otabek won’t shut up about you, and we both know that he’s usually a closed book.”

Yuri considers this for a moment and it’s then he realizes— Otabek’s fairly quiet around anyone else that isn’t him. When had that happened? He and Yuri eased into a friendship, the subtle shift occurring without either of them realizing it.

It isn’t unwelcome, and that more than anything, is the biggest surprise to Yuri. It’s been a long time since he’s craved the attention of another person.

Maya’s gaze softens slightly and she says, “I’m only teasing.”

“Stuff it, hag,” he says, snapping back immediately. 

Maya’s face turns into a scowl. “If I’m a hag, then Otabek’s a hag too.”

“What does that even _mean?”_

“We’re twins, obviously. You know, watching your interviews, I thought you were smart, but you’re actually pretty dumb, aren’t you?” Yuri bristles and Maya laughs. “Cool it, I’m only joking.”

Yuri huffs at that, shoving an entire manti into his mouth for good measure. He doesn’t dislike Maya and her abrasiveness; if anything, she reminds him of himself. At the same time, it’s an intimate look at how he’s treated people over the years and he can’t say that he’s a fan.

It’s dumb to think that Otabek will ever give him the light of day in the way that he wants.

“You aren’t stupid,” Maya says. “You can tell, you know. When they interview you. Everyone always treats you as nothing more than an athlete, but you’ve got depth.”

“I _am_ nothing but an athlete,” Yuri says around a mouthful of food. 

Maya is quiet for a moment and that’s when Yuri sees Otabek in her. They look enough alike, but their contemplative thinking face is nearly identical. It’s a little creepy, Yuri thinks.

“No one is just what they seem on the surface,” she finally says. “If anything, Otabek and I know that best of all.”

Yuri smirks. “Right, because who’d ever think you were a bartender?”

“Not just a bartender,” Maya snaps, “I own the damn place.”

“Then, there’s Otabek who can apparently do anything. I was going to hire an electrician, you know, and the next day he shows up with nothing but his toolbox and a book. The lights were working by the end of the day.”

“I’d still get a second opinion,” Maya jokes, “Just to make sure he hasn’t crossed wires anywhere.”

“Just in case I haven’t what?”

Both Maya and Yuri stop dead, caught red-handed in their teasing of Otabek. He stands several feet away, two traveler cups of coffee in his hands. Not one bit amused. 

“I told her that you can do anything,” Yuri says. 

“Except take the plunge,” Maya says. It’s a weird thing to say, and both Otabek and Yuri turn to give her a confused look. She shrugs. 

Otabek grunts before dropping onto the lowest step. “Your coffee, your majesty,” he says with an amused huff. 

“I do believe that I requested ‘my overlord’.”

“That implies that you rule over me.”

Yuri shoots him a challenging grin. “Don’t I? I’m your boss.”

“Yuri—”

“Okay, this is getting weird,” Maya cuts in. 

“Weird?” both Yuri and Otabek say, causing Maya to roll her eyes. 

Then, she trains her gaze directly on Otabek, who swallows under the scrutiny. “Manti?” she asks sweetly, though her smile is anything but, holding out the bag to Otabek. 

“I think I’m going to get back to work,” he says instead, standing abruptly before heading into the house. 

Yuri blinks. “That was… strange.”

“Nah,” Maya says, “That was pretty on-brand. Otabek’s weird when it comes to doing things for himself.”

“Maya, I say this with absolute respect-- you’re making no sense.”

She hums at that, popping a dumpling into her mouth. “Maybe not right now, but you’ll get it someday. Until then, let’s finish these off, yeah? Then you can go back to ruining that garden.”

“Fixing it, you mean,” Yuri says. Maya shoots him a dubious look. “Anything’s better than what it is now.”

“Wise words. You should take your own advice.”

Yuri pauses as he stands, rubbing crumbs away from his mouth. “I’m not sure what you mean by that.”

Maya stands from the porch steps as well, careful not to lose her balance on the teetering wood. Yuri plans to tell Otabek that this is definitely the next project because he’s tired of dodging broken planks like they’re the traps from an Indiana Jones movie. 

“Otabek hasn’t said much,” Maya says, quieter than she’s been their entire chat, gentle almost. It’s a weird look on her and it sounds even stranger coming from such a foul mouth. “But, I can often tell what he’s thinking. The people in this town? They won’t talk, but everyone knows that you’re not here to fix this place up.”

Yuri sighs. “Look—”

“It’s not a judgment,” Maya cuts in. “Only an observation. Otabek and I, we get it, more than you can possibly imagine. Losta is a small place, but it’s full of amazing people. People just like you.”

“I don’t know what I’m looking for,” Yuri says. “I don’t even know really why I’m here, I just wanted to get away from it all.”

“Well, maybe you’ve already found it,” Maya says, a devious little smirk spreading wide across her face. Yuri hates it immediately. He’s known her for barely an hour, but he can tell that she’s the meddling type; she’s been meddling in his affairs since before she even came to talk to him. 

“I should go make sure that Otabek’s not about to electrocute himself.”

“Oh, you can definitely check out a few things on him—”

Yuri groans, dragging a hand down his face. “Look, I might be as gay as a fucking unicorn, but that’s _Otabek_ you’re talking about.”

Maya blinks. “And?”

Yuri flounders, not expecting such a blunt response. “What do you mean, ‘and’?”

Maya’s expression shifts and then she laughs. “Allah, above, he hasn’t made a move yet, has he?”

“Made a—”

“Yuri,” Maya says, “trust me when I say that you have a guaranteed chance when it comes to my brother.”

Yuri’s mouth falls open, then he turns defensive, arms crossed over his chest as he scowls. “Who’s to say that I even want a chance? Ugh, also, that’s your _brother._ Gross. _”_

“Otabek needs to get laid,” Maya says simply.

“No, _no,_ we’re not talking about this—”

“Yuri—”

“No!”

“He’s gay!” Maya shouts after him. Yuri just barely hears it over the slamming of the front door. 

Otabek peeks around the corner at the sound, frowning slightly when he sees Yuri plastered against the door, back pressed against it and arms held wide. He can feel the embarrassment burning bright on his cheeks.

“Your sister,” Yuri blurts. “She’s something.”

“‘Something’ doesn’t even begin to describe her.” There’s a pause, and then, “Did she say something to you?”

“Nothing important,” Yuri says in a low murmur, but judging by the way that Otabek’s gaze narrows suspiciously, he’s pretty sure that not a word of it is believed. “Teased about you, mostly.”

Otabek groans at that. “She claims it to be her divine duty as my older sister.”

“She said you were twins.”

“She’s older by about ten minutes and very proud of it.”

Yuri laughs at that, his wildly beating heart calming ever so slightly. He’s always wondered what a sibling would be like, or really, any sort of family. He doesn’t get on with his mother, there was never a father, and now Grandpa’s dead, so Yuri’s three-and-O for dysfunctional. 

Still, it’s refreshing to see the clear bond that Maya and Otabek have, even if his sister comes off as abrasive and meddling. 

“She reminds me of you,” Otabek says. “I mean that in a good way.”

“She’s pettier than me, that’s for sure,” Yuri jokes.

“Nah,” Otabek says. Then he freezes like he hadn’t meant to say that aloud. But, he doesn’t take it back, instead, looking away abruptly as he rubs at his nose, trying to play it cool. The pink that dusts across his face is really fucking adorable and Yuri feels his throat go dry at the sight.

Shit, _shit,_ this isn’t good. Yuri’s come to Losta to figure out what to do to his life, not fall into a relationship that’s doomed from the start. Fuck Maya, for being on the nose, and fuck himself for immediately taking a liking to the first cute guy to come his way in what feels like years. 

And fuck Otabek too, for being so kind and genuinely likable. It’s been harder and harder not to stare, as of late. And watch. And peek around the corners, smiling gently as Otabek works on the inn. 

“You aren’t the first guy to think I’m good-looking,” Yuri finally says, hoping that it sounds aloof and unbothered. 

It’s like the spell is broken. “Yeah, right,” Otabek says flatly, the weight of every past relationship Yuri’s ever had crashing down over the both of them. Maybe being famous will do him right, for once, nipping whatever this is in the bud. 

Yuri rubs at the back of his neck awkwardly. “So, how’s the wiring going?”

“It’s going,” Otabek says. “Actually, come take a look.”

Otabek doesn’t make a big deal about anything, so Yuri doesn’t either, following him into the kitchen. They lean close together as Otabek shows him what he’s working on, talking with animated fascination. 

The touches linger, but they aren’t searing, and they don’t feel forced. They’re comfortable around each other. It’s been a long time since Yuri’s felt that, just ease in the presence of another.

He finds himself staring, and it’s not because the shape of Otabek’s face, or his handsome brow, or his well-styled hair. It’s not the muscles that he fails to hide behind his loose-fitting shirts.

Yuri watches the way that Otabek carries himself, the joy that he has for his work, and his love for the inn. And, for Yuri’s Grandpa on the rare occasions that Otabek opens up about their friendship. Yuri wants to hate the warmth that it brings him, but he can’t. 

As the days pass, they share more and more. Lunches and dinners, coffee in the morning. Dumb little stories as they tinker around the property. Yuri’s shit at fixing things, but Otabek’s patient, willing to do things over and over again if it means that he’s involved. 

Yuri thinks back to Maya’s words, about how Otabek’s interest is guaranteed. He sees it every day, in the small moments that they share, and for a little while, he lets himself wonder. 

But, Yuri can’t stay here forever, even if he’s come to like the quiet and the calm, or the disarray of the inn. It’s slowly coming together and sooner rather than later, it’ll be time to let it go. 

Still, it seems like home, something that Yuri’s almost forgotten the feel of entirely. He doesn’t really want to let it go.

**_Elsewhere_ **

Otabek’s tired and sore when he steps into his townhouse. 

“So, when’s the wedding?”

He pauses, letting out a long sigh. He’s definitely too tired to deal with his sister, mostly because she can’t seem to get it through her thick skull that there isn’t anything between him and Yuri. Even if he wants there to be. And he’s pretty sure that Yuri’s not opposed to the idea either, but that’s a whole can of worms on its own.

“Yuri isn’t here to date,” he says, dropping his bag onto the floor. “Also, quit breaking into my house.”

“It’s not breaking in if I’ve got a key.”

“What’d Seung-gil do this time?”

Maya shoots him a very rude gesture. “Nothing,” she says, “he’s out of town for work. I’m lonely. Cook for me.”

“Cook for yourself,” Otabek says. 

“I’ll do it here and burn down your place, then.”

Otabek didn’t spend three years practically rebuilding his place from scratch, only for it to go up in flames because his sister doesn’t know what a grease fire is. Or how to use a pan. He sighs, dragging a hand down his face, and sets about washing up for dinner.

Maya watches him for a blessedly long, quiet moment. Then she ruins it by saying, “Quit torturing yourself.” Yuri, she means. With her, it’s always about Yuri. It’s been about Yuri since he was ten years old and still figuring out what he wanted in another person. 

“There isn’t a point,” Otabek says, digging into his freezer, seeing what he’s got to work with.

“Get out there and live a little. What’s the worst that can happen?”

“He’s going to leave,” Otabek says. Not, _he might leave,_ it’s that _he will leave._ Everyone knows it, despite their efforts. And honestly, he doesn’t even blame Yuri. There’s a lot for him here, but nothing that he really wants. 

“What about your promise to Nikolai?” Maya asks.

“I’m keeping it the best that I can.”

She hums at that. “He can change his mind.”

“He’s made his choice abundantly clear,” Otabek says. 

“He likes you,” Maya says. 

“Yeah,” Otabek agrees. It’s painfully clear with the way that they dance around each other. And fail to do so at the same time. He promised Nikolai he’d look after Yuri, even if it means just letting him be. Even if it means letting him go. 

Easier said than done.

“Allah, above, the two of you are so stupid,” Maya whines, letting out a frustrated grunt. 

Otabek doesn’t deny it.

**Author's Note:**

> Find me on [Twitter!](https://twitter.com/JB_Foss)


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